Purpose of elite schools?

Replies to: Purpose of elite schools?

@SatchelSF Trinity is still known to be tops, followed by Horace Mann, Riverdale. But this is a list by those who care about name, prestige, bragging rights. All of the private high schools in Manhattan (let's include Brooklyn too) send their kids to the same universities as as Trinity, HM and Riverdale. I can say that in my daughter's 8th grade graduating class, the kids all went on to different HSs in the city. They sent two kids to Trinity, Stuyvesant, HM, Riverdale, St Ann's, Packer, Brearley, Chapin, Friends, etc. (including some boarding schools). These kids went to all different private and public high school schools and they all just got into their First choice university via ED Last month. I guess my point is that one doesn't have attend what people feel are the best private HS in order to get into top universities.

@ChoatieMom "I’ve also never understood the idea that you need to be rich to value education for its own sake. Can someone please explain this? We believe solely in education for its own sake and raised our son that way."

You don't need to be rich to value education for its own sake, but if you are not rich it is more critical to have a plan about where you are headed and how you get there. Most families can't afford a $250k for an unmarketable college degree that ends with the kid moving back into their basement with no job and no plan.

For example, if a rich kid wants to major in classic Latin, that may be a much better choice than if a low income, first generation student is making that decision.

jmho

P.S. As member of an average public school family whose kids are doing reasonably well in college, I am really enjoying the insight into the private school parents perspective. Please keep posting!

Certain posters on this and similar threads like to bring up math aptitude and IQ as a definition of intelligence. There are many types of intelligence that aren't captured by IQ tests nor performance in math competitions, nor do those things equate to success in its many forms as an adult. I've never heard one top boarding school (and I assume it applies to NYC privates as well) claim they are looking for applicants with the highest IQs. They don't define desirability/aptitude so narrowly (thankfully). I really don't see how talk of IQs and AMC scores relates to the topic of the Trinity head's letter.

@doschicos and @skieurope It seemed to be that the reference to IQs and other scores is because they are hard facts that with which to validate absolute intellect and talent from school to school. Somewhat like SATS are used to validate grades from high school to high school. Private schools have so many other influences on their student bodies --full pay students, legacy, possibly athletes at some schools (more boarding than city) and the requisite diversity bucket whereas most gifted and talented schools across the country are free, have little to no sports and tend to have admissions based primarily on test scores . The OP/question was "the purpose of elite schools." Elite can mean many different things and how elite are schools like Trinity, Collegiate, and Dalton that, for example, use the parents' college as a component of admission? It would be nice if there was more consideration of facts in many of these thread discussions where it is clear that political doctrine/opinion is underlying opinions.

If were considering applying to a school today, I would want to know about incidents like these. I would also think that graduates of elite institutions (many of whom are on these threads) would want all facts about any topic to inform their own opinions even if they decided that they still essentially believed a certain set of policies or agendas was preferable.

If you read between the lines....this letter is actually a very warm and fuzzy stun grenade thrown at the ROI crowd.... which- if I had to guess- is completely out of control at Trinity . You're welcome. ;)

This Head of School could start "giving back" by agreeing to a lower salary! The tuition at Trinity is only slightly less than the median NYC household income, after all, and only about 20% of the kids at Trinity are on any sort of financial aid. The school as a whole only "gave back" 14% of its rack rate total tuition. (Cf. Part VIII, Line 2a and Part IX, line 2, here: http://990s.foundationcenter.org/990_pdf_archive/135/135563003/135563003_201606_990.pdf).

I guess I am the only one put off by someone who is taking $1.1MM+ from a "non-profit" lecturing parents and students on "giving back" and "service"? If he would only go back to his salary of two years ago, they could increase the number of kids on financial aid by at least 10%. He'd still be making upwards of 18 times the median NYC income, and he's got a nice UWS brownstone to live in (approx value i'm guessing > $15MM) for free! This is the example the kids should follow? Giving back 14.4% of your rack rate tuition is walking the walk? It's like the old joke about the original Hawaiian missionaries in the 19th century: They came to do good; and they did very well, indeed.

I’ll bite on the question posed by this thread’s title (without regard to the letter itself), though I suspect I will probably regret doing so. Oh well, here goes…

For me, thinking about what a top-shelf education should entail begins with an evaluation of what I view as the most important goals of such an education. In no particular order, here are some of the more important goals to my mind:

1. The student should graduate with an understanding of how fortunate they are to have received a top-shelf education.
2. The student should graduate with a feeling of responsibility to give back to others who were not so fortunate.
3. The student should graduate with the ability to acquire knowledge and solve problems on their own, without being spoon-fed solutions.
4. The student should graduate with the ability to work with others to accomplish goals in an environment where others have different viewpoints and agendas.
5. The student should graduate with the confidence of knowing that they have received an exceptional education in the core concepts and subject matter of English, history, math, science, and social studies, and the student should graduate with at least basic skills in a different language.
6. The student should have been afforded, and should have taken advantage of, the opportunity to dive deeply into an area of interest.
7. The student should have learned how to truly listen to and consider the viewpoints of others, and the student should have learned about what motivates others to have their viewpoints.
8. The student should graduate with the confidence of knowing that they can tackle any issue to which they set their mind.
9. The student should graduate with the confidence of knowing that they possess the ability to advocate for themselves, others, and the things in which they believe.

Simply put, for a school charged with educating students with the potential to develop into tomorrow's leaders, I think the school should strive to produce graduates who care about the world and its problems, will consider the informed opinions of others, possess enough perspective/education about the world and its people (of varying circumstances) to make responsible decisions, have developed an area of particular interest to a very high level, and have acquired the tools to translate their thoughts into action.

I would want the school to aspire to produce capable, responsible world citizens, and I would want the school to provide students with the opportunity to develop exceptional skills, where such skills exist in a student. For example, if a student is an engineering genius, I would want that student to have the opportunity to fully develop his or her talents in that area. While this could arguably be viewed as just making that student a more marketable employee, I think it's fair to say that the founders of some of our tech giants have tremendous influence in the world, and wouldn't it be wonderful if everyone who wields such influence were also a knowledgeable, responsible world citizen?

In my view, although many of the items on my list could be simply explained to students, any such explanation could never carry as much impact as a student's direct interaction with other students having decidedly different backgrounds, perspectives, and values.

All of that said, I do not hold the illusion that others would necessarily define what an “elite” education—whatever that means—in the same manner. As consumers, all we can do is try to find a school that best fits our ideals and needs.

I like your post, @CaliPops, and agree with most of it except for #6 which is more applicable, IMO, to college than a high school education which should be more broad-based and focused on students as generalists not specialists between the ages of 14-18, although that opportunity to delve often does exist.

@DeepBlue86 - Regis has 26 NMSF in Class of 2017 (latest data available), I think Trinity has approximately the same. Regis is not coed BTW, so it does not seem like you are as familiar as you think you are. Horace Mann and Trinity are both larger than Regis as well

Um, no, @SatchelSF - on September 13, 2017, in the article I cited, which actually contains the latest data available (because it's for the class of 2018), it was announced that Regis had 16 National Merit Semifinalists. You are correct that Trinity had approximately the same: 15, as I said. Check the link. Your number is from an earlier year.

Horace Mann has 734 in grades 9-12. Trinity discloses 960 in grades K-12. Regis has 534 in grades 9-12. As best I can tell, Trinity's upper school is about the same size as Regis (although it could be smaller); HM's is somewhat larger. Maybe HM's relative performance was a little worse based on the larger class size, but it doesn't change my conclusions in any significant way.

And, by the way, even in a year where Regis had 26 National Merit Semifinalists, that would just about put it in the same category as Stuy, Brearley and Collegiate (and behind Hunter) percentagewise. All of those schools, by the way, have plenty of smart kids, who are getting a great education - Trinity is most certainly not in a class by itself. I don't have the data to say which school's smart kids are the smartest of the smart, or which school has the highest average smartness - and neither do you.

My apologies, @DeepBlue86, for not immediately recognizing that you were using the latest NMSF data (Class of 2018). My bad!

The moderator has threatened to shut down this side discussion, but if he or she allows your comment to stand, perhaps he or she will allow an acknowledgment and rebuttal, and my attempt to relate this back to the thread topic.

First, I’m glad to see that you are using NMSF data to try to validate impressions. I am usually the “testing” person on this forum – and I invariably get called out on it – so when another poster brings it up I am always happy. I have often made the same argument on this forum that you implicitly make: namely, that objective data like SAT, PSAT, NMSF, SAT II scores, etc. do have a valuable role in evaluating schools and student bodies. Matriculation at “elite” schools doesn’t tell us too much, of course, as so many are “born on third base” with respect to college admissions.

Second, you are basing your whole criticism of my characterization of Manhattan private schools on one year of data, but I think they are roughly representative, so let’s go with them. (As an aside, numbers of NMSF are down significantly for Class of 2018 at many top high schools – I have noted this on another thread with respect to PEA, and now we see that is true with respect to Trinity and Regis as well).

Third, my original comment that seemed to set you off (post #10) was that Trinity represents one of the very few private schools in Manhattan with a “good number” of “very smart” kids, and I acknowledged that the characterization depended upon one’s definitions. I am happy to add Collegiate and Brearley to that list, although I note that each is very small, comparatively. I know Collegiate reasonably well, and I never pretended to know much about girls’ schools in Manhattan.

Fourth, with regard to Regis, my only comment was that it “walks the walk” with regard to service and giving back, starting with its being tuition free, of course, despite its not having the funds to spend $45MM on a renovation or pay its headmaster more than $1MM per year. I said that “on average” Regis kids are “a bit smarter” than at Trinity (post #15), and made no comparisons with the elite public schools. Once you understand the selection process (Trinity doubles the size of its class in 9th grade, taking already “proven” kids in relation to its elementary school cohort who were evaluated back when they were 4 years old), which primarily involves testing at Regis and a smattering of other factors at Trinity, it’s not a large jump in logic to get to my “a bit smarter” conclusion. I stand by it.

Fifth, I didn’t mean to exclude Hunter College High School. I’ve known many, many kids at Hunter over the years. They are smarter, on average, than kids at Trinity or Regis or any other private or parochial. I never claimed differently. I also think Stuyvesant kids are a lot smarter than at any of the non-publics. Really, how could it be otherwise? The NMSF results that you brought up (and other things like math competition results) confirm this. You didn’t address the outliers issue at the top end of the scale, but again given the admissions processes at Hunter and Stuyvesant, can there really be any doubt?

Last, many people on this forum wonder why I go on so much about testing. Many people simply try to equate scores with preparation and socioeconomic class, which of course is largely nonsense, as demonstrated by the fact that free schools like Hunter and Stuyvesant outclass even the toniest and wealthiest of schools, in which students presumably have every environmental advantage possible. (As if this needs to be validated – there have been reams of studies confirming that SES is not very important after controlling for intelligence.) Even Regis punches well above its weight here – ok, I’ll give you Collegiate (another $50K+ school with very limited financial aid), and of course well mannered boys would never fight with girls, Brearley included! BTW, I disagree with your characterization of HM as “somewhat” larger – it’s 40% larger than Regis, has fewer NMSF, and of course also costs $50K+.

Testing represents the only plausible avenue for relatively disadvantaged kids to distinguish themselves – the same kids that the Trinity Head of School purports to care about in his missive to the elites on “noblesse oblige.” Every single time tests are dumbed down, grades are inflated, and character and extracurricular activity screens are instituted, relatively disadvantaged but smart kids lose another chance to distinguish themselves - and collectively academic measures are really the only way reliably to distinguish themselves in what is becoming a rat race. No one is calling the admissions offices on their behalf, their parents can’t afford to pay $7,500 so that they can pretend to build a house in Nicaragua over the summer, and the wealthy parents don’t want the competition anyway. The Trinity Head of School does nothing – and will do nothing – to upset this dynamic, which has been evolving for about a hundred years now. But as I said in my first comment on this thread (post #3), purchasing indulgences is easy when you are not the one paying.

This head of school could start “giving back” by agreeing to a lower salary!

Why is that? What do you think his salary should be? At what salary would you be more comfortable with the ideas he espouses in his letter? I don’t know this man, so I don’t know how he chooses to give or give back with his time and money outside of his job. Do you?

@doschicos I am 100% with you. Being a part of such a great school community has taught me so much when it comes to understanding education. To me, it's not about IQ scores, test scores, etc., it's about educating the whole child. It's about my children becoming all around skilled learners and good people.

@PhotographerMom I thought this same thing (fuzzy grenade). Furthermore, I am close friends with the parent of a recent grad. She was completely fine with the letter AND thought it raised some excellent points. My guess is that the writer intended for Trinity families (and maybe all other high school families) to "take a breath" and to stop putting soul-crushing expectations on our kids. That advice is also valid for any school... and any family.

"What do you think his salary should be? At what salary would you be more comfortable with the ideas he espouses in his letter?"

I'll take the bait. His education attainments are modest (degrees in English Lit, no Ph.D.), he has been at Trinity for over 9 years and evidently hasn't changed the culture to his liking - that's a lot longer than he'd get in the corporate or finance worlds - and he's only worked as a teacher or administrator so far as I can tell. He also misunderstands basic concepts like contracts versus covenants (hint, they are analytically the same). I'll say, given the cost of NYC which I know well, $400K more or less in salary. Plenty of people work harder for much less, even in NYC. After all, it is still about 7 or 8 times median NYC income. I'd still let him live in the free brownstone of course. If he loves education, he'll take the deal. I mean it's still the chance to live quite comfortably, especially after the housing allowance, and how many people get to mold one of the very finest secondary education institutions?

The savings for the school would mean more than 10 additional full financial aid scholarships, at least a 50% increase from what they are now. Perhaps more once you translate the cash salary savings into noncash tuition charges (just what is the marginal cash cost of each student?). I'd suggest a transparent merit competition open to the whole city, with guaranteed meeting of any financial need for the winners. They could use the SHSAT, as it has already been validated by hundreds of thousands of test takers, and has a high enough scale to allow fine distinctions at the top. My guess is that there will be some important - and humbling - side benefits for the existing parents and students alike once the winners get on campus. A win-win!

Of course, he'll respond that his salary is set by a compensation committee after being benchmarked by an outside consultant. In other words, he'll rely on the same credentialing factories that he decries. And, of course, that relying on a test for admissions - even for a small portion of the class - is just so unfair.

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